OK,DU-DU my latest ltte in response to the cries against socialism

[w8liftinglady]

http://www.thedailylight.com/articles/2009/01/08/opinion/doc49664b0dab8c3850546478.txt

To the Editor,

Recently, I wrote a letter to the editor that generated a lot of response, much of it negative, regarding a national health plan. I love this discussion because at least we are talking about health care. Many readers called me and the program socialistic because of the government funding of this program. I did want to remind you all of a few programs that are run by the city, state or national governments that we would be worse off without:

• Police and fire departments are funded by city, state and federal funds. • Streets and bridges are funded by state and federal funds. • Farmers and ranchers are assisted by many state and federal programs. • Public schools exist because of state and federal funds. • The public library system in most towns and cities is publicly funded. • 86 percent of America gets its water from a publicly funded utility service. • Sewage treatment plants are state and federally funded. • The local, state and national weather services are publicly funded. • The state and national park systems are publicly funded. • Our military and veteran’s system is federally funded. • The Rural Electrification Act provided electricity to 85 percent of America’s farmland that had no access to electricity. • The GI Bill has enabled millions of veterans to serve their countries and pursue their education afterwards. Many of the nurses and physicians I know are there because of the GI Bill. • Social Security and Medicare have provided a safety net for millions of older Americans who would have had nothing in their retirement years ... again, federally-funded.

Do you support these programs? I guess you are a socialist, too. If not, I suggest you petition your representatives to remove local, state and federal funding of these programs. Privatize it all. And please, show me how you’ll do it.

[last_texas_dem]

1. Good job!

You laid out the facts very well, and your letter ought to give some of the folks who whine about socialism in a knee-jerk fashion some food for thought.

Not much for the wingnuts to argue with there, although, considering their warped minds, I'm sure they'll figure out some way to do so!

[w8liftinglady]

14. Thank you ..

unfortunately,my neighbors are not an enlightened bunch.

[blm]

49. One of your best, imo...

and I've been reading your lttes for quite a long time. ;)

[madmom]

2. Here is part of what I wrote in a LTTE before the election, ..

Feel free to use any thing from it or not....


Then we have everybody's favorite bogeyman...the "socialist". Whether you want to believe it or not, America is built on socialist programs. So if you are so strongly against them might I suggest that if you receive WIC, food stamps, Medicaid, or Medicare, don't ever use them again. If you get government grants for school or farm subsidies, stop! If you are ever in need of help, don't you dare call the police or fire department, or for that matter the National Guard or Reserves, and by all means don't ever send your kids to school again (public or private) unless you pay their full tuition out of your pocket, no vouchers. Oh and by the way, don't even consider cashing that unemployment check.

[Rabrrrrrr]

3. And stay off the fucking (socialist) roads, too. Including the one your house is on.

And you better cut the electricity, water, and sewage off to your home, too.

And you should over-ride or remove every safety/efficiency/pollution device on your car, because your car has all those because of a socialist governmental system that cares about your safety. Actually, you shouldn't even drive a car, because it was made in an OSHA-regulated (there's that damn socialism again!) factory.

[malaise]

4. Another excellent letter

K & R

[rocktivity]

5. It's time to start using the "f" word

"Even socialism is better than fascism, which is exactly where we're headed if we stay the course."

:headbang:
rocknation

[w8liftinglady]

6. kick...please comment

this is not going to win many friends :)

[calimary]

54. This message needs to be repeated over and over and over and over and over

and over and over and over and over and over and over again.

I enjoy reminding people that even that selfish cheapskate schmuck grover norquist expects his trash to be picked up every week, and would howl like a stuck pig if it weren't.

[katmandu2007]

7. I'm not comfortable with nationalize healthcare

Do you remember the days before private companies handled the driver's license, car regs, and car
emmission programs? Easily a day spent trying to get anything done, six weeks or more waiting for
a license, title, or whatever?
I have excellant private insurance that responds quickly when I need medical attention. I don't
want to lose it for a national plan. When I was unemployed and therefore uninsured, I could go into
the emergency room and demand care. They had to give me immediate care. I would not like to lose
that option with a national program.
I don't want a knee jerk reaction of one size fit all healthcare, with all the waste ($ and time)
that is common with such programs.
When I hurt, I want immediate care at my docs or urgent care or emergency room. I don't want the gov't telling me I cannot have immediate care, but must wait a month or so like my friends in Canada
and England.
I want the gov't to come up with a plan that helps the uninsured without lowering the quality of my
health care. I have perfect right to demand that!

[w8liftinglady]

8. you will still have the option to pay for private insurance.

[David Ricardo]

11. so you get to pay twice for health insurance then? n/t

[anigbrowl]

19. Most likely your private insurance would be tax-deducible in whole or in part

That's how such things are managed in at least two European countries I know of.

[w8liftinglady]

9. BTW-comments such as the above will come flowing...please help me counteract them

[anigbrowl]

12. Having lived in England for a decade, it's quite a bit better than that.

When urgent care is needed, it's available. Non-urgent cae you wait for sometimes, because not all conditions require immediate treatment (eg things like hip replacements, where you can generally manage to get around). It's not absolutely perfect, but neither is the US system.

[uberllama42]

21. I don't know what state you live in

but I just renewed my driver's license here in Pennsylvania, and it was remarkably quick and painless. The same could be said of all of my dealings with the driver's license center here. Thing is, it's a government operation. I've never noticed any difference between the private auto registration place and the publicly run driver's license center. I've never noticed that government departments are any less efficient than private shops. The whole story about a bureaucratic morass seems like a bogeyman to me.

And you honestly think stiffing a hospital for emergency care is an efficient and ethical way to distribute medical care? With a universal insurance system, everyone will be guaranteed emergency care. We won't lose that safety net. The difference is that the hospital will have a guarantee that that visit will be paid for, since taxpayers would foot the bill. Right now a hospital has to eat the cost if a person "go(es) into the emergency room and demand(s) care."

And if you want to talk about wasting money and time, nothing can beat our private system, which is built on an incentive to not pay for health care. Insurance companies make money by paying for as little care as possible, after all. The insurance companies spend hundreds of billions of dollars every year figuring out how to deny people health care, whereas in Canada there is no such incentive since most people have government insurance, which only has to figure out whether or not you actually need help. Additionally, we in the U.S. spend literally twice as much per capita on health care as Canadians for similar or inferior outcomes ($3000 vs. $6000 in 2004, according to the WHO).

Any government system has its deficiencies, but I think a lot of the problems we hear about with the systems in other countries are either avoidable or outright fictional.

[Bigmack]

23. "...wait a month.. in Canada or England..."

I have friends in both places who disprove that. In England, a friend had problems with vision in one eye. Went to the doc, and had surgery for a detaching retina that day.

A friend in Canada recalls being "mobbed" by doctors when he complained about vague abdominal pain. They suspected liver/pancreas cancer. He had CATs, MRIs, colonoscopy... the whole nine yards. Immediately.

[dysfunctional press]

26. private companies don't do our driver's licenses- it's the state government.

and it goes just fine- i've never had any major problems with it- and i've never been in the secretary of state's office(where we get our dl's in illinois) for more than 45 minutes at the most- hardly "easily a day".

"I have excellant private insurance that responds quickly when I need medical attention. I don't
want to lose it for a national plan. When I was unemployed and therefore uninsured, I could go into
the emergency room and demand care. They had to give me immediate care. I would not like to lose
that option with a national program."

how do you figure that a national program would do away with emergency room care? are you saying that emergency rooms don't exist in canada and england?

it sounds like you want socialism on demand- only for those circumstances where it benefits YOU.

what a swell guy!...btw- what do you want on your pizza? :shrug:

[w8liftinglady]

28. If you lose your excellent insurance policy(and I hope you don't)

would you want to use the ER as a doctor's office if you felt a lump in your breast...or couldn't pee at night...or saw a mole that didn't look right...or if you had bone grinding bone in your knee...or if you had a nagging cough that wouldn't go away...or if your adult son felt a lump in his testicle...or if you were hoarse and didn't know why.
I have taken care of people who lost their insurance when they became sick,and had to rely on the ER for their treatment.It is ineffective and a waste of resources.

[eShirl]

39. nobody's going to make you give up your private insurance

sheesh!

[Kansas Wyatt]

47. Just some questions about your excellent insurance...

In recent years:
Have you seen that your premiums rise sky high?
Are your deductibles now at a rate that almost render your insurance useless, unless for major problems?
Again, are your co-pays at a rate that has become obscene?
Does your plan require you to pick a doctor or medical provider from THEIR group?
What is your waiting time to see your doctor, and do you have to schedule a day off from work? Hmm... Some Americans cannot afford to take a day off or fear taking time off, especially at this time.
Does your doctor have the final decision with regards to your health care treatment?

Private insurance has priced itself out of usefulness, and is worse than the alleged horror stories from countries with government health care. Insurance Companies and the Medical Industry have been playing the good cop / bad cop routine for long enough, while the majority of Americans have been getting defrauded, shook-down, fleeced, robbed, raped, and pillaged.

On Edit: Have you, like many other Americans, noticed that insurance companies are now rampant with maximum pay-outs for the year, lifetime, per family member, etc. clauses?

[Aristus]

48. So you just waltz into an emergency room and demand care, huh? Most ER care in America

is either funded or underwritten with tax dollars. Most uninsured people seek primary care at ER's which are not staffed or equipped to provide primary care. So as long as you are "demanding" care at an ER paid for with my tax dollars, why shouldn't I be able to "demand" care paid for with your tax dollars? Publicly funded primary care would save the taxpayers billions in dollars wasted on patients who receive their only care in ER's. But realizing that requires a slight effort of logic, which not all are capable of.

So, two things:

1. Switch to an e-mail program that offers spell check. It's an "excellant" feature.

2. I "demand" that you:

- Stop driving on my roads.
- Stop using my electricity and water.
- Stop breathing my air, which Federal law is supposed to be keeping clean.
- Start working 6 1/2 days per week, with a half-day off on Sunday for church, while the rest of us enjoy our socialistic 40-hour workweeks and two day weekends.
- Put your children to work in coal mines to protest the government's socialistic interference in child-safety concerns.
- Keep out of my State, Municipal and National Parks.
- Stop using my weather services.
- Travel only in planes that fly outside of my FAA-designated safe-flight air corridors.
- If they are building a nuclear power plant near where you live, demand that the socialistic Nuclear Regulatory Commission ignore safety considerations for the life of the facility.
- Don't complain when I let all of the violent criminals incarcerated in my state and Federal prisons out of their cells and send them to your neighborhood.
- Don't even think about availing yourself of my police and firefighting services.
- If you are using a municipal Internet server that I paid for, log off now and stay off!

And if none of that makes an impression on you, move to Somalia, where they don't have government. See what a success they've made of it?

[w8liftinglady]

50. "excellent" post.

[Aristus]

51. Thanks!

:pals:

[anigbrowl]

10. Government programs =/= socialism

I'm European, where governments are a lot more active and there's (mostly) universal access to healthcare and education (if you can meet the academic standards, university tuition is free or very close to it, like community colleges here). Mind you, there's a rather high price to be paid for this in terms of taxes; most Eurozone countries have sales tax of around 20% and income tax is a bit higher than here too, even for low incomes.

But...it's not what I'd call socialism. Over there, we refer to it as 'social democracy'; the key difference is that private enterprise is still alowed (indeed, encouraged) to flourish, and state ownership or business o monopolies is mostly seen as a bad thing (except in France, which has a lot of government-owned monopolies...including tobacco. And French society is probably a lot more stratified and elitist then in the US, they take the 'Ivy League' concept to extremes).

Anyway, mcuh as I'm in favor of social programs (particularly the two mentioned in the first paragraph), I don't think much of socialism qua state capitalism. In my experience, state monopolies, while providing security for their employees, are NOT consumer friendly and often provide really poor service.

For example, when I first got a phone in the US it was a revelation. I went to the phone comapny with some ID and proof of address, they sent a guy to my house the next day and my phone was working. And local calls were free, yay. By contrast, getting a phone in the UK and in the Netherlands (at the time, both with state monopolies) took a week and 10 days respectively, had a higher rental cost, and I had to pay by the minute for local calls. Oh, and you get billed quarterly...personally I prefer monthly billing to avoid sticker shock but the quarterly thing is just how it goes in europe for some reason, not directly related.

things like physical and social infrastructure are often, though not always better run by the state. things like services and production are often though not always, better run by private industry.

[David Ricardo]

13. public goods,

defined as non-excludage and non-rivalrous can be justified by the government. i.e., if your neighbor buys defense for the whole country, they rest of the country gets the exact same benefit.

merit goods are often confused with public goods but are not the same.

health care is certainly excludable- the more one person consumes, the less inherently is made available for others. that's why public schooling and public transit, while government sponsored, are not public goods in technical parlance.

[anigbrowl]

15. Health care is not a matter of free consumer choice

A person can influence their own healthcare needs to an extent (by not abusing their body, getting reasonable exercise and so forth), but generally one can't plan one's medical needs the way you can the consumption of other goods and services. Ill-health, however, can have a ripple effect beyond the individual, as it places a burden on employers, family and so on when the person is unable to work. So illness incurred for lack of access to preventive or timely care is a public evil.

[w8liftinglady]

16. and I will add to that dental care.

The main thing about HR 676 is the ability for people to finally go to the dentist..
Educate yourself,Naysayers,and THEN come back and we'll have a discussion
http://www.hr676.org/

[David Ricardo]

17. I can't control how hungry I get

I naturally get hungrier than everyone else. Therefore, since I never planned for it, I should be subsidized. After all, it wasn't my choice to need to eat more.

I know it's an absurd example, but just because you have different needs than others doesn't mean you should have others subsidize it.

[anigbrowl]

18. Faulty logic. Your appetite is largely predictable.

On the other hand, many chronic and degenerative conditions aren't apparent until they result in symptoms, at which time one may already be ill. I am in favor of subsidizing such, within limits (eg wholly elective procedures like cosmetic surgery). This means I end up paying part of the bill for people who have hard-to-treat conditions - I dunno, cystic fibrosis o kidney failure or whatever), but since I too might fall victim to some devastating condition I'm happy for the risk pool to spread among all taxpayers.

[David Ricardo]

20. spreading risk doesn't eliminate risk

look at the subprime housing meltdown. there was plenty of risk and it was spread out a ton- all the individual homebuyers who took out high-risk loans.

I realize I probably won't sway many minds on health care, but if nothing else, take away from this the fact that net risk is net risk, no matter how many times you chop it up, regardless of your opinion on UHC.

Does UHC create a moral hazard against healthy habits? I honestly don't know. Is there any literature which shows how people's behaviors changed before and after implementation of UHC?

[anigbrowl]

22. no, but diluting provides economies of scale.

Regarding Moral Hazard, you may want to look at the harm-reduction approach pioneered by New Zealand, where conditions which are frequently related to a patient's lifestyle are subject to agreements between doctor and patient about behavior modification, and speed of access to treatment contingent on the patient sticking to those agreements. a simple example would be someone in need of a liver transplant agreeing to reduce or eliminate their alcohol intake.

[David Ricardo]

25. but isn't non-refusal one of the tenets of UHC?

One of the refrains I hear on here is that there should be immediate access free of charge for anyone, everyone, for any reason. You seem pretty wise, but is there a danger then of government being reserved the right to dictate lifestyle choices....i.e. "Thinking this way about issue X is bad for your mental health, we won't treat you unless you tone it down". And then, what do you do to chronic offenders?

I know it's grasping at straws, but weird shit happens when you mix in politics.

[anigbrowl]

27. That's grasping at straws from a straw man

Of course people say that, but even a moment's though would show that it can't be free, care would have to be funded out of taxes in some way. I'm sure you understand this, so why waste time arguing with a naive position?

What we're after here is a pragmatic solution that offers the greatest good to the greatest number. the current US healthcare delivery system clearly doesn't do that, or ~20 of the population wouldn't be living outside it, resulting in a different flavor of moral hazard. I have no expectation that a US 'National Health System' will be perfect or always provide timely care, and I do worry that individual cases will end up becoming political footballs for the distraction of an ignorant public...but the objections to reform of the current system are hypothetical and distinctly marginal, whereas the individual, social and economic failings which stem from it are real and expensive.

We have an opportunity to consider those hypotheses while designing an alternative, in order to minimize the unwanted outcomes, but we also have to be pragmatic about the delivery of services, and not allow the perfect to become the enemy of the good.

[w8liftinglady]

24. That is where I definitely agree with you.Maybe I have a different perspective.

As a nurse for the last 28 years,I have seen the tragedies that lack of insurance causes.I have watched people wring their hands as their adult children lay dying due to poor resources.I have watched sick grandparents try to care for their little grandchildren in their hospital room while their own children are incarcerated.I have seen the ravages of HIV when it first hit the hospitals,of sickle cell,of Lou Gehrig's disease,of stroke,of car accidents.I have cared for 5 women who died while pregnant,2 on Christmas eve,2 on Christmas,and 2 the day after Christmas.I have held a man's guts in his belly as we rushed him to surgery.I have cared for over 60,000 people in my career.None of the above would have happened if it wasn't for WIC,Medicaid,and Federal student loans...you see,I was one of those losers who needed help to pull myself up by the bootstraps,with a newborn baby and no husband.

[area51]

29. Just rated up your new LTTE.

You bring up points that I've mentioned to nazis who scream "socialized medicine", as I've told them if they don't like single-payer, they need to refuse Medicare and SS, and told them never to use the police or fire departments. It never ceases to amaze me how brainwashed people are that they have single-payer fire and police protection, but don't want that for healthcare. I've also brought up the "appeal to selfishness" factor that's been mentioned by other DU'ers, in that if other people can't get medical treatment, it could affect them, for instance, if someone gets TB or some other communicable disease and can't afford treatment because we have a for-profit broken healthcare delivery system, they go around infecting others.

BTW, nurses rock. :yourock:

[w8liftinglady]

32. Thank you SO much.Every comment counts

my letters are graded by number of comments and most read.I had the honor of acheiving the most comments EVER on my last letter...
http://www.thedailylight.com/articles/2009/01/01/opinion/doc495d426911647280308142.txt

[deaniac21]

30. That is one BFD!

[Pithlet]

31. Love it.

:thumbsup:

[Cleita]

33. You are good.

Succinct and to the point.

[w8liftinglady]

40. thank you..

:hug:

[w8liftinglady]

34. please hit the link and register...I promise they won't spam you..

my letters are rated by most read and most commented...the more people who register and read(translate advertising revenue),the more likely the editor is to keep printing my letters(remember-I live in Republican Hell).

[area51]

35. Shameless kick. (n/t)

[w8liftinglady]

36. hehe...ditto-I'm gonna need a lot of help on this one

[ColbertWatcher]

37. K+R, off to the best for you! n/t

[w8liftinglady]

38. thanks,friend..I can tell already..the locals are angry

my rating went from 4.0(perfect) to 3.3 overnight.Sigh.

[ColbertWatcher]

53. Looks like you've been targeted by some quasi-freepers!

You must be doin' somethin' right!

[w8liftinglady]

55. lol..I just don't want them stealing my message

[Redbear]

41. That may be your best LTTE yet.

Way to go! I will rate it up.

[w8liftinglady]

42. Thanks,RedBear-the locals are rating it down big time

[w8liftinglady]

43. Again,If you would be kind enough to leave a comment at the site,I'd be grateful

[Kansas Wyatt]

44. That's the part I don't get.

How can people be so against socialism, when they already have embraced and enjoyed it? Corporate America has already shown us that they are much worse at medical management than the government could ever be. Government would be making decisions about how to spend the resources at hand, while Corporate America makes decisions about how to spend the least amount possible.

[w8liftinglady]

45. I didn't get that either.

People around here use the word "Socialist" like they used to use the word "commie" during the Cold War,while they prescribe to many"socialistic"programs

[w8liftinglady]

46. I left out the USPS,although Fedex and UPS have taken some of their business

[w8liftinglady]

52. The locals have started putting their 2 bits in...please rate it up and comment at site

[w8liftinglady]

56. kicking for a few more positive comments...Thanks